Ling Kang Seng (fourth right), Kong (fourth left) and Hardi (third right) cut the ribbon in a symbolic opening of the Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Dr Wong Soon Kai Inter Club Swimming Championship at the Bintulu Public Swimming Pool yesterday. Looking on at third left is Ong together with organising committee and team managers.

Brian Lu with the two gold and one bronze medals he won yesterday.

BINTULU: Five new meet records were created as Sibu Amateur Swimming Association (Sasa) grabbed the lead in the Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Dr Wong Soon Kai Inter-Club Swimming Championship at the Bintulu Public Swimming Pool yesterday.

Fielding 31 swimmers for this year’s competition, Sasa collected 537 points to top the 13-team competition at the end of Day 1.

In a distant second were Kuching Amateur Swimming Association 2010 with 292.5 points, followed by defending champions Sea Dragon Swimming Club from Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, with 243 points, Power Aquatics Swimming Club with 239.5 points and Gymkhana Club Miri with 210.5 points.

This year’s meet showed great promise in the lower age categories and incidentally, all the day’s records were registered in Group E for eight year olds and below.

Hogging the limelight was Brian Lu Yek Hong of Sasa who created two new records.

He clocked 43.31s in the boys 50m breastroke to erase the old time of 45.05s set by Eddie Law Li Hui in 2016.

In the boys 100m breaststroke, Brian registered 1:35.69 to take the gold and broke the old record of 1:39.97 held by Jonathan Yek Ei Henn since 2014.

Kuching Amateur Swimming Association 2010’s Vanessa Liew Xing Yi also broke the record in the girls 100m freestyle where she clocked 1:39.38, chipping .29s off the old time of 1:39.67 set by Ivy Ning Chai Yun two years ago.

The two other record breakers were Nur Syaziellah Tsen Sey Jing of Persatuan Renang Labuan in the girls 50m butterfly with a new time of 37.84 (40.37), and Frederic Annabelle of Kelab Rekreasi Petroliam in the girls 100m freestyle by clocking 1:17.38 (1:20.00).

A total of 265 swimmers are taking part in the meet organised by Sarawak Amateur Swimming Association (Asas) and hosted by Bintulu Amateur Swimming Association (Basa).

Ling Hang Seng, who represented Bintulu MP Dato Seri Tiong King Sing, officiated at the opening of the meet yesterday.